Pubdate: Fri, 05 November 1999 Source: Examiner, The (Ireland) Copyright: Examiner Publications Ltd, 1999 Contact: http://www.examiner.ie/ Section: Opinion Author: Pat Brosnan ONE WAY TO PLEASE FARMERS AND JUNKIES Emmet Stagg may have come up with the reason why so few people in the Labour Party knew anything about - or couldn't remember - the pounds 28,000 loan written off by Woodchester Bank. Cannabis! Not that I'm suggesting they're all smoking their brains out on the illegal leaf, but if they were it might explain how so few were aware that so much was written off for so many. It might also help their electoral profile with younger voters, who would see the party more in touch with reality. Now, Emmet Stagg wants cannabis decriminalised for purely altruistic reasons because he insists that he himself does not indulge in it. He smokes a lot - cigarettes - and imbibes in the odd drop of alcohol, but nothing more. So, it beggars understanding why he stood up in the Dail this week and asked the Government to consider decriminalising cannabis. As soon as his party colleagues got a whiff of what he was up to, they went into immediate denial. They would probably rather remember the Woodchester grant, than be associated with anything like the legalisation of the drug. Despite the fact that he utterly denies he’s on cannabis, I'm afraid his logic for trying to have it almost available on draught defeats me. Having stated in the Dail that a recent youth survey showed that 60% of people under the age of 24 use cannabis as their drug of choice, Mr Stagg went on to say: "It is not sustainable to have 60% of the young people of the country in criminal capacity." If you follow his line of thought, it follows that if 60% of the young people of this country decided to engage in murder, then murder should be legalised in order to prevent so many young people being categorised "in criminal capacity." Naturally, he went on to mention the old chestnuts of drink and tobacco which, because of the potential harm they could lead to, should also be banned. I presume he doesn't want to deprive himself of his cigs or his odd drop, but he’s on a loser there because both are completely legal to indulge in. After his performance in the Dail, the Labour Party didn't want to know him, and referred any press queries to the man himself. Rather like the writing off of the Woodchester pounds 28,000, party headquarters didn't know, doesn't want to know and knows nothing about it. Of course, if they had any sense, they would back Emmet Stagg, go back to the Woodchester for another lash of money to buy a bit of land and start growing the stuff themselves. They could corner the market, pay off the bank if that was necessary - and they'd be on a political high as well. At least, with the under 24s. Because that’s not on, Mr Stagg should look for support to one of the most influential lobbies in the country - the farmers. Those lads will turn their hand to anything that will bring a cheque through the letterbox and at the moment their circumstances are dire. They must be, because they promised Mary Harney recently they would pay as much as 12.5% income tax if she would look after them. To facilitate her, they were prepared to consider themselves as private companies, like any ordinary multi national, in order to get around the undoubted, unfair outrage that would follow from the ungrateful PAYE sector. No good. In typical fashion, our Tantaiste rejected such a generous offer and the unfortunate farmers found themselves in the awful situation of having to offer their wives as a bargaining ploy. Their wives, they said, should be given a stay at home allowance. That was probably the wrong tack, because Mary Harney wouldn't buy that either. Had they argued the wives should be given an allowance for being married to farmers, they would probably have had a stronger case. Even the PAYE sector could hardly argue with that. Getting back to Emmet Stagg, his best bet is to convince the farmers to support him in his mission to have cannabis legalised. All over the country, farmers are getting paid - or were up to recently, at any rate - for set aside. That’s that wonderful EU concept whereby farmers get paid for doing nothing with fields. They don't grow anything in them and they get paid handsomely for doing so. Emmet Stagg could convince them to start growing cannabis on those fallow acres and they wouldn't have to worry about craw thumping to Mary Harney. I don't know what the street value of the stuff is at the moment, but there’s obviously a big market out there for it. The fact that it’s illegal to grow shouldn't bother the farmers too much. Taking a couple of legs of New Zealand lamb out of a butcher’s shop without paying for them is illegal too, but it hasn't bothered their conscience too much. When it comes to protecting their income, the farmers are in a field of their own. And they're not beyond contriving a bit of publicity. Some of them are also even prepared to engage in conspiracy, as witnessed just this week by a disgraceful episode in a butcher’s shop in Limerick, whose sale of lamb is 99% Irish. According to an officer of the IFA, they got a member to order three boxes of New Zealand lamb from the shop. Then, when the boxes had arrived, other members went into the shop, took the boxes onto the street and mounted a protest against the butcher for stocking the Kiwi lamb. The very same lamb the miserable sheep farmers were protesting about wouldn't have been on the premises only for them. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek Rea